I'm The Candy Monster

I never realized until yesterday that I was the candy monster in my house.I looked in one of the "hiding" places where we keep candy and there was a bunch in there. I mean a lot! What surprised me, is that it is Easter candy. I had my surgery the week before Easter so no candy for me right?! If I had not had this surgery I'm almost certain that there would be no candy in there yesterday. I knew I ate a lot of candy, but I'm shocked and now I'm pretty certain I was the candy monster. Before, when my kids went to get candy it would be gone and everyone's pointing the finger at everyone else and I'm there dumb-founded as to how all the candy could be gone already. Not now! Even the cookies and other snacks for my kid's lunches are lasting weeks instead of days now. Was I really eating this much? Either my kids are making me feel really bad or it's the real deal and now I know for sure.

The extra candy is just a reminder that you have decided to make a lifestyle change and have stuck with it.  Good for you!!

Thanks!

Wow i was the cake and cookie monster. had to hit my 2 fav bakerys everyday. delpontes for peanut butter brownies. and than the macaroon shop for either meltaway or cheese danish. and of coursethe last few months before surgery shop rite bakery for richards chocolate cake slice big enough 4 3 of course i did'nt share. no ijust walk padt or drive by and say i can't have those ever again. actually most of us who binge on sweets r alergic too it addicted . we r the chosen who will never again be able to have just one more bite, bevcause one is too many and 1000 is never enough. and the result would b weight insanity all over again. i just accept it. sugar free ice pops and jello certainly help. that was my nsv. keep up the good work.

That is a nice NSV!  Great job on making changes to put the Candy Monster in his place.  My wife and I owned an artisan chocolate shop for six years and I always said that it was a good thing I was allergic to chocolate or I would have been 700 lbs!  Keep up the great work!

Allergic to chocolate!!!  Oh man that would suck for me. I love my chocolate and that's the only kind of protein shake I can drink. I hate all the rest of them.

LOL I know what you mean.  I didn't realize how much I was poking in my mouth either until I started to notice stuff like the snacks not disappearing and the amount of leftovers when I prepare meals.  I have actually had to dramatically change the amount I cook.  Its really amazing when you think about.  I made Saturday breakfast of bacon eggs biscuits and gravy.  After everyone had finished eating and I was cleaning up there was about 15 to 20 strips of bacon left on the plate.  We have NEVER had leftover bacon before.  I find myself standing there staring at the stuff thinking was that really me eating all that....I think I must have been in some serious denial about my issues, and now that its all right out there in my face there is no way I can say.."I don't know why I'm so big..I don't eat that much and I never sit down".  Well obviously a lot of the reason I didn't sit down was because I was busy running back to the kitchen for more food. 

The thing that really gets to me is that I really didn't believe I was eating that much.  I would say stuff about not eating much and my hubby would kinda roll his eyes sometimes and I would get really super mad at him.  But looking back I don't understand how I didn't see it.  I would regularly hit the drive thru for fast food and I would always order the meals for everyone, then I would get an extra burger or something for me to munch on the way home, then another extra "big" burger in case I got hungry later. 

One of the hardest things I have had to do in relation to this surgery was to admit to myself that I actually had/ have an eating disorder, and have most likely had it since I was a young girl.  I started off starving myself when I was in 7th grade and started cheerleading.  Thinking back, for most of my young adult life I was most likely border line anorexic / bulimic.  I kept syrup of ipecac in my purse at all times.  Even after my oldest daughter was born binge and purge was the rule of thumb.  Then I met Amphetamines and made a whole new best friend.  When they took ephedrine off the market I actually sat and cried, but where there is a will there is a way.  For the next several years I was the speed queen.  No distance was to far to drive if there was a dr. there that would give me a script.  

Then (thankfully) I got preggers with my youngest son, the pregnancy was shortly followed by the high blood pressure..so no more pills, I was too scared.  And I completely lost all control and ate, and ate, and ate.  For the next 7 years I guess I tried to have a slice, piece, plate or bite of everything I had denied myself.  LOL I was livin' large with no limits.  

Now I'm paying the piper, and I have to learn how eat/live all over again.  Sometimes I will catch myself thinking I'm gonna hide that candy and eat it when no one is around to tell me I shouldn't.  In my mind, if no one sees me, then it doesn't count. I have to fight it every day.  I have a whole bottle of phentermine sitting on my bar waiting for me.  I fight it every day.  I tell myself I don't need it cause I'm doing it right this time.  So far I'm winning, but everyday is a new battle. 

I probably need therapy, but my insurance doesn't cover it.  So I write alot.  Sorry for the long post......

" if no one sees me, then it doesn't count"  I thought the very same thing!!! Hey, if a tree falls in the forest and no one is there, does it still make a noise? Yep the bacon thing is amazing too. I've noticed that my youngest (who is falling right in line with where I was at his age) is taking notice of what I eat. He had a friend get his face book profile hijacked and some kind of post about drops helping him lose 18 pounds. At first he just told me he had a friend who lost 18 pounds doing some diet and that he was already skinny. I told him he didn't need a diet, he needed to stop snacking. Then he told me it was some face book post his friend made and that's when I remembered seeing that weird post on his face book. I'm betting it's some sort of scam and that his friend's face book got hijacked for a minute or two. I told my son there is no way his friend did this and it was junk. I told him again, you don't need a diet, just stop eating all the crap late at night and eat reasonable amounts. He tried to tell me he doesn't eat late at night so last night at 8:30 he walked in with a handful of cookies and a glass of milk. I immediately told him, that's what I'm talking about right there. You don't even realize it and neither did I. He's not big, but he's a little chunky and right where I was at his age. He's got all the same "potential" as me. I think he's finally starting to get it though. I don't pick on him, but I remind him when he eats something late or takes a big portion that that's how dad did it and if he keeps it up, he'll be the in the same place as me when he gets my age. He's fairly active and still has not hit his growth spurt yet, but that doesn't mean anything.

I've done so many of those little secretive eating things over the years myself. I used to go to Wal Mart or Target and buy a 8-16 oz bag of chocolate covered peanuts and eat them on my way home and I only lived 15 minutes from there. I figured if I could get them all down and hide the bag in my car somewhere that no one would know. It's so different now. I still sort of want the candy but now I know I just spent a small fortune on surgery and went through all of this that why would I wreck it by eating candy. It really keeps me away from eating the things I know I shouldn't.

I don't mind long posts at all. I write a lot myself. It's very therapeutic and I probably need a litte bit of that therapy myself. But like you, the insurance doesn't really cover much/any of it. I forked out $1,200 for my Psychological clearance. Yeah me, I passed!! I never considered myself as having an eating disorder, but I guess I should look at that again. I never had anorexia or bulemia, but I guess all the hiding and overeating are disorders.

I see myself in my two youngest kids to, and it scares me to death.  My daughter who is 11 is one extreme..always concerned with her weight and talking about diets.  She is skinny as a rail at 5'1 and 102 but she is always exercising and looking at herself in the mirror saying she is fat and obsessing.  My son however is the other extreme of me.  He is 7 and his dad and I have had a long time disagreement about him.  He is  5' and he weights in at 122.  In his first grade class he is really a giant among men.  Literally.  The child eats all the time.  His dad started him at full contact football when he was 4 years old.  He is stronger than a lot of men.  Last year his football coach got the idea to let Jason "attempt" to tackle him to show the other boys on the team an example of how to break a hold.  Jason put the coach on his hind end.  As you can imagine Bill (my husband) is on cloud 9.  His favorite thing to say when I state worry about his weight or how much he eats..is "leave him alone, we can't all be the quarterback".  He says that when Jason is 12 and can start weight training he will firm up.  I say well what happens in 5 years won't stop him from developing juvenile diabetes now. 

Wow, beverly - can I just give you a (((HUG)))?

Stories like yours are so inspirational to me. This is really hard sometimes, but we CAN do hard things! I'm so proud of you for what you've accomplished and for putting it out there so we can all benefit. I think we all see a little bit of ourselves in some of the things you wrote here. You rock!